Retell: Truss makes punctuation entertaining in this adaptation of her best-seller Eats, Shoots & Leaves. Each page contains illustrations of seemingly identical sentences. Take for example the following sentences:

Eat here, and get gas.

Eat here and get gas.

One implies that you get gasoline, the other implies that the food makes you (and others) uncomfortable.

Topics: punctuation, grammar, usage, commas

Units of Study: This book can be used during any Writing unit

Habits of Mind: thinking and communicating with clarity and precision, striving for accuracy

Reading Skills: monitoring for sense

Writing Skills: using commas

Thoughts: The illustrations in this book truly convey the importance of commas. In the back of the book there are explanations for why the meaning of each sentence changes with an omission or insertion of a comma. There are other books in the series that I haven’t checked out yet but I hear are equally delightful. Essential mentor texts for any editing unit.